Can I Help YOU?

[RogueInnovation]

You will realize with time that if you want to make more money you need to focus on increasing your:
-communication
-confidence
-mindset
-emotion control
Someone who is super confidence, who is not afraid of failing, who can control his emotion (fear mainly) and who can communicate really well are usually super successful.

Golden advice and so simple.

Not being afraid of failure, having the confidence to go outside your comfort zone, controlling fears and emotion, and communicating really really well.

How do you do all that with such a great attitude?
I seem to have a heat or scornfulness tied in with my attempts to do all that (rollseyes at self, you can be upfront if its something I won't like) and I can't figure out why (yet).

 

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[Laverdure]

Thanks in advance for taking time to help me out, I'm kind of stuck here.
I have got some specific questions about the niche I am persuing.

I have been working on a website that sells lights for outdoor sports for a while now.
I have received samples and the quality is ok.

I have encountered a couple of problems though:

1) It is very difficult to estimate the size of this market

2) I buy "my brand" lights in china, the quality of some batteries is doubtfull to say the least. (Is this a red flag??) (High returns?)

3) NO re-occuring revenue: Because of the 45% tax in my country, I estimated that I would have to sell close to 100 lights (average) to match my current 'daytime' income.
Does this seem as unrealistic to you as it does to me?

4) People sell equivalent lights unbranded on ebay&amazon for about the amount that I buy them. So for about half the price that I would sell them.

My market would be only europe, shipping+customs would be to high to target America.

Thanks a lot if you want to take time to answer these questions!
Not sure if I have to ditch this or keep on working.

Why would you focus on a market you aren't sure about the size?

I would personally focus in a market that I have some kind of knowledge to start off because otherwise it might be harder for you to go through the process specially if the quality/price/market aren't very good for you.

I'm not saying it's a bad market but I know nothing about it so it's hard for me to guide you and give you advice on what's next.

 

[Laverdure]

LaverDure,

If you were to create a brand new, start from scratch e commerce website, also selling your products on amazon, ebay, etc, what solutions would you use for getting the site up? Would you get hosting/domain package and put wordpress on it? Would you go the Bigcommerce/Woocommerce route? Or would you simply outsource the entire thing via Elance?

Thanks for posting this thread, should turn out to be a good one!

Gravy

I would first start off by testing the market/idea before you invest big money into it.

What are you looking to sell?

I'm far from a pro in terms of ecommerce but I could def help you with marketing.

 

[Laverdure]

Golden advice and so simple.

Not being afraid of failure, having the confidence to go outside your comfort zone, controlling fears and emotion, and communicating really really well.

How do you do all that with such a great attitude?
I seem to have a heat or scornfulness tied in with my attempts to do all that (rollseyes at self, you can be upfront if its something I won't like) and I can't figure out why (yet).

To be honest there is "no secret sauce" even myself I have to improve these area (and we all do) but it's all about getting out of your comfort zone... the more often you get out of it, the easier than become.

Example: when I was single, I was going out in club and I wanted to talk/date girls but I was so freaking shy so I started reading books about it which didn't chance anything because I didn't have the balls to go hit/talk with a random girl so I figure out that I should start with very small things like: asking random question to girls that walk by me in real life then I would slowly increase the level of difficulty until I had to hit a girl in a bar.

I remember how I did it for the first time. I gave $100 to my friend in a club and I told him you will keep that money unless I go talk to 4 random girls.
So each time I would go talk to a random girl, he would give me $25 back and trust me I failed hard but with time your ego go away and you build confidence and with time I realize that I had to go through that process that was scaring me as shit to become confidant with women.

That's the same thing for every other aspect of life.

If you don't go out there because you see other people that are better than you or bigger than you...

Well, you will never grow, learn and become better.

Everybody fail in life and it's actually a good thing because you learn so much out of it.

There is a quote that says if you want to be successful quickly,you have to fail as twice as fast.

Your ego scare the shit out of you because we let external things control ourself. (people thoughts and jugdments)

If you take a minute to think about it ... people thoughts are only thoughts nothing else and yet most people let these thoughts control their whole life.

So if I have something to tell you and this will be the best tip I can give you, go do whatever you want and dedicated yourself to do it until you succeed no matter what and trust me you will be successful in what you do.

You will have to go through sad moment but when this is going to happen just remember it's part of the game and smile at it .

 

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[RogueInnovation]

I've been thinking about what you said because I do want to be relevant with how I take your advice (its good advice and comes from a good place, so it would be terrible to waste it).
I put aside a whole day to think about it (no half measures ).
I must have thought on this from 50 different angles.
And all that time thinking on it, has allowed me to process what you mean a lot better (I usually spend each day on one thing, it is just interesting that the idea had enough value to merit that attention, like I said it is golden even though so simple).



I think that I lack a way to form a connection with what I am doing. That attitude might be something like, being more willing to do things because I see value in it, value that is perhaps external to that individual result.

For example:
Lets say I'm selling 50 pairs of shoes, and I say "I hate it when my shoe breaks, I have to go through that whole process of getting a new shoe and I procrastinate", in this scenario I'm creating a context of empathy with the client not just to sell but to sell myself, even though I have 50 pairs of shoes to sell (externalising the value from selling one shoe to one customer).

Now lets say the guy talks to a girl, and he says "I hate it when I have no one to talk to at these things, I get bored and just end up staring at other people having boring conversations", with no empathy other than to get her number or attention that is not good right?
But if he says to himself "whoa, she has no one to talk to, she is staring at the wall like I do... How can I change this?", his heart gets behind it, right? Because he externalises the value.

The way I see it, I have self imposed boundaries so that when I overcome them its genuine. No one can tell how well you will perform when you "do get up" because that is always surprising, but what they can do is create a LOT of resistance and put a lot of pressure on the moment you do get up and try something.
If a person is to "show what they have got under the surface", I think that the connection or drive they feel needs to be significant enough to motivate them to use all their energy, control their nerves, and carry themselves with confidence, right?

I say all this because I think you are saying that I should trust myself more. And as long as it is warranted, then I shouldn't worry because I'm not doing anything too weird, I am just doing what everyone has to do at some point. I need to change how I see action and why it is "warranted".


If I'm not too far from your meaning or point, maybe you could give me a few tips on how you make your approach to business more trustworthy or reliable so that I worry less about making mistakes when I try?

 

[Laverdure]

From what I've read your "ego" and "fear" is controling you a lot which mean you either don't have any confidence or you still have the choice or you aren't in a "too bad situation".

When I first started it wasn't because I built confidence, it's because I had no choice to change my situation. (zen******* could approve this - Dale if I miss spelled his username).

So here my guess is... that your problem is all about your confidence level and the way you "PERCEIVE THINGS".

If you go through failure and you see it as a result of taking action and instead of telling yourself I suck, you tell yourself "today, I'm a better business man because I learned that, I shouldn't be doing this because it's not working".

If you keep taking action and you fail 567 times for example. don't you think you will be closer to be successful (making millions)?

It's a journey, you have to believe that you can make it happen but you should be aware that it take time to achieve it.

The more you learn and the more you apply what you learn, the faster it will happen... (there is other factor but these are the main one).

now let me ask you a question...

What do you fear from making mistake? (as you stated

so that I worry less about making mistakes when I try?

)

 

[Laverdure]

testing

 

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[Oven]

So its been 3 days of Facebook ads and I made my first sale, two actually but overall I'm down $40. I ran the ads for $20/day and made it super targeted. I targeted people that liked a specific concert tour and had the picture of my ad set to a picture of a poster for that tour.

The first day I ran the ad I got my first purchase, the guy ordered two posters and I felt really confident. The second day wasn't nearly as good though, I made no sales.

Today(the third day) in an effort to make my ad more targeted I changed up the demographics a bit, originally I had it set to males and females ages 19+ in Canada that liked that album. I noticed that out of all the people that liked my ad a huge majority were older males so I changed my demographics to males ages 30+ that liked the album in Canada & US. I'm not sure if todays sale was a result of me changing the demographics a bit or not but even if it was, I still didn't make enough to break even. I added a lot of the changes that you mentioned to the site before running the ads and am not really sure what else could be changed. I setup a conversion pixel on my checkout page and saw 6 people go there and I'm not sure why so many dropped. Is it usual for like 66% of people to drop out at the checkout page or does this prove my hypothesis that there is something wrong there (Maybe too high shipping or not enough payment methods?). I currently have 2 payment methods PayPal and Bitcoin but I'm under the impression that people can use there credit cards with PayPal. I could also try changing up the text for the ad but I don't know how much that would help? I'd love to hear your opinion if you need any other information just ask. Thanks.

Edit: Just got another order but it's going into the fourth days budget

 

[tafy]

Oven,

Its definately the shipping, people expect free shipping. Think about pricing it with shipping included and they get discount for more than 1 item.

 

[NVaz]

I haven't been much active on the forum lately and I would like to answer any kind of question (I'll do my best to answer them all with the knowlegde/experience I have).
Feel FREE to fire up!

Thanks for doing this.

I feel like I'm kind of losing my momentum. I've consumed as many info as i can about entrepreneurship/startup biz , read books, podcast, INSIDERS Subs, etc. but i have take ZERO action (i know, my bad )simple because 1) i'm stuck w/ the myth that i need an idea to start a biz, although i can't find a pain our a need, 2) I'm overwhelmed w/ so many questions every time an idea cross my mind that i find myself paralyzed by analysis and don't know where to start. Any tips or advice ?

 

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[Laverdure]

I know this kind of feeling trust me.

The best thing to do is forget about failure or the idea .. just write down what you are going to do and do it.

Take massive action without thinking about... what if X ... What if Y.

Let me know what you want to do and we will follow up together .

Also PM I could personally help you.

Cheers!

 

[Laverdure]

So its been 3 days of Facebook ads and I made my first sale, two actually but overall I'm down $40. I ran the ads for $20/day and made it super targeted. I targeted people that liked a specific concert tour and had the picture of my ad set to a picture of a poster for that tour.

The first day I ran the ad I got my first purchase, the guy ordered two posters and I felt really confident. The second day wasn't nearly as good though, I made no sales.

Today(the third day) in an effort to make my ad more targeted I changed up the demographics a bit, originally I had it set to males and females ages 19+ in Canada that liked that album. I noticed that out of all the people that liked my ad a huge majority were older males so I changed my demographics to males ages 30+ that liked the album in Canada & US. I'm not sure if todays sale was a result of me changing the demographics a bit or not but even if it was, I still didn't make enough to break even. I added a lot of the changes that you mentioned to the site before running the ads and am not really sure what else could be changed. I setup a conversion pixel on my checkout page and saw 6 people go there and I'm not sure why so many dropped. Is it usual for like 66% of people to drop out at the checkout page or does this prove my hypothesis that there is something wrong there (Maybe too high shipping or not enough payment methods?). I currently have 2 payment methods PayPal and Bitcoin but I'm under the impression that people can use there credit cards with PayPal. I could also try changing up the text for the ad but I don't know how much that would help? I'd love to hear your opinion if you need any other information just ask. Thanks.

Edit: Just got another order but it's going into the fourth days budget

Look listen here ... even if you failed you should be very proud of yourself because you just did what 99% of the people don't and won't do. You took action from what I told you and you didn't even wait for it.

See it like this okay.

Here is the bad news:

You lost money

Here is the good news:

-YOU MOVED ONE STEP FORWARDS (first time you didn't make sale)
-YOU HAVE A NEW CUSTOMER
-YOU HAVE NEW KNOWLEDGE EXPERIENCE (DATA)
-YOU KNOW A LOT OF PEOPLE ARE LEAVING YOUR CHECKOUT PAGE WHICH MEAN YOUR CONVERSION RATE ON THAT PAGE NEED TO BE IMPROVED.
-Many other things...

There are still MILLIONS of thing you can do to improve this and I don't want to give them all right away because otherwise you would be overhelmed.

ALSO... you will learn with marketing you got to TEST 1 variable at the time and isolate each of them if you want to test multiple at the TIME.

THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!

Here is some basic stuff you could start playing with:

Targeting
Your ads was far from good but also far from bad (what was your CTR/CPC)
Your Sale Funnel... (IMO it suck)
There is many other thing to ADD/CHANGE

But...

Here what I would do ... Give me your stats in terms of traffic/CTR/CPC/SALES$/SPENT

I'll give you some next step.

CHEERS

GOOD JOB

 

[Laverdure]

ALSO SHIPPING/PAYMENT METHOD WILL MAKE A SUPER HUGE DIFFERENCE IN YOUR SALE.

LOOK...

You know that your first customer bought 2 of them .. so even if your shipping is low with a GREAT SALE FUNNEL your customer will buy more than one ... but with this shipping cost .. you scare the shit out of them...

THERE are many people here that can help us with SHIPPING.

DALE - zen******* surely can help

 

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[Twiizlar]

Hey man whats up. I have a website called sneakercount.com . This is where people buy and sell shoes locally. A "craigslist" for sneakers type of deal.

Anyway i know it can be sucessful but i need help. I have been posting ads on the website by myself for about a month. I pull the ads from craigslist. But i need more ads and more people to build social proof and that is the part i am struggling at. I have about 200 page views a day but ive only really advertised in my city.

Currently the traffic is derived from blogging, social media, and posting in facebook "buy and sell sneakres" groups. I dont have the time to post many ads so i want to build the presence in my county and then expand.

All in all, i just need help building social proof.

 

[Laverdure]

I'm not sure to understand your model.

Do you own the shoes ... or people pay to advertise their shoes on your site?

 

[Twiizlar]

I'm not sure to understand your model.

Do you own the shoes ... or people pay to advertise their shoes on your site?

They dont pay. Its all done locally. The user chooses their State and they can post ads. Other people see the ad and other local people email/phone them to get a deal. Then they locally meet up like craigslist. I dont own any of the shoes.

PS: if you dont know the Sneaker market here is a video by ABC News

 

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[NoveltyInSpades]

Laverdure,

Thank you in advance for starting this thread and offering your insight!

My website is www.milliondollar2014.com - it's a blog that details my attempt to make a million dollars in the calendar year 2014 starting from $0, where my readers can learn from my mistakes and triumphs and follow my progress. My personal goal with the site isn't e-commerce sales or anything, it's simply to provide valuable and/or interesting business content and build a readership/social media following. Having that platform will open doors for me, for example polling the market about my ideas, sponsored book reviews, and just getting the word out about any business ideas I do go through with.

Do you have any advice for SEO for my site, and how to build a readership/SM following?

 

[RogueInnovation]

What do you fear from making mistake?

Its like dancing kinda, where you dance in your own bubble kicking your partners knees until you know how to lead her, then you kinda open up.

I probably fear other people trying to dominate me with pointless small minded stuff, or maybe I wanna find a way to better communicate what I'm aiming for (getting micromanaged rather than dealt with independantly).
I am trying to isolate and seperate individual parts better and coordinate them. Mistakes lead to a restrictive launch, and I want my launches as open as possible.

I figure it is stuff without a secret sauce, but I always try to find tips for how to face it with a better outlook.

Like what if I fear that someone is going to really dig in to a point that isn't as credible/understood as the rest. If they get stuck on THAT point, and I lose their attention to the main benefits of the products and services.

I fear it getting dragged out and becoming a burden, and I want to be much cleaner and streamlined than that. Get my plans mobile and on their toes, rather than snapping back to bad habits and a bad marketting position.

 

[Gale4rc]

why would I (or anyone) ask you anything vs the magic 8 ball?

You have 5 followers on twitter, if you can't market yourself how can I trust you to market my company?

ps your shirt is missing a button (free help as well)

 

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[NoveltyInSpades]

why would I (or anyone) ask you anything vs the magic 8 ball?

You have 5 followers on twitter, if you can't market yourself how can I trust you to market my company?

I'm not mad at your attempt to cut down my efforts.

But consider the possibility that I have a lot of business expertise to offer,
that there is value in both my failures and successes,
that I never said that I was a marketing company,
(just that I might do book reviews once the viewership builds),
that I've never done the blog route before,
and that SEO has recently changed after another Google algo update.

Can't a guy ask an expert - who openly said he was great at SEO/internet marketing and willing to offer advice to others in this community who weren't - for advice?

 

[tafy]

I'm not mad at your attempt to cut down my efforts.

But consider the possibility that I have a lot of business expertise to offer,
that there is value in both my failures and successes,
that I never said that I was a marketing company,
(just that I might do book reviews once the viewership builds),
that I've never done the blog route before,
and that SEO has recently changed after another Google algo update.

Can't a guy ask an expert - who openly said he was great at SEO/internet marketing and willing to offer advice to others in this community who weren't - for advice?

You blog is basically a big progress thread, to get followers you have to show some great progress. Start making some $$$ and show your readers how you did it.

 

[Gale4rc]

Sorry I definitely came off harsh and I apologize but, the whole point is - you're 'offering' to help me but, you won't give me a clue who you are? //Past company(s) //anything that might give me a hint on where I can get the most value you from you and know that it's from a credible source.

 

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[NoveltyInSpades]

@tafy - Yes that is the concept. I am working on my projects but I'd like to be working on SEO for my site at the same time since I know that takes time to take effect.

@Gale4rc - Good point. I will include a blog post and an about section that shares some of my background, credentials, and why I'm a good person to be watching. I strongly believe that my having zero dollars is a result of misguided efforts and attempts to start businesses containing fatal flaws due to lack of wisdom (only comes with time/experience), rather than from lack of intelligence or capability (high school valedictorian, double business major from top 10 university, etc.). I've learned from years of personal experiences and think this is the year it all comes together.

When I couldn't afford Christmas presents for my family this Christmas, I finally told myself that I had to give it everything I have in a concerted effort. I've always wanted to give others much more than I've been able and if I hit my goal, a big chunk of it is earmarked for charity. I want to do everything I can to improve my chances at success and that includes building an audience.

 

[NNR]

How can I raise my standards and keep them consistently high as possible? Mainly in terms of income generation.

- In other words, how do you stay hungry? Very hungry.

 

[SloMoNoMo]

Hi Laverdure,

In answer to your original post:

Yes, yes you can help me. (... and I think I need lots of help!)

Here is my situation; I have written a book and it has been selling ok in the 8 months I've had it on the market (nothing spectacular, but steadily increasing and world-wide so far). I need to market this thing so that I can get it in front of more people's eyes. It seems that 1-in-10 people purchase it who view the Amazon page (from what I can tell). -I think that is pretty decent (?) ... and I have some killer reviews on the Amazon page also.

What do I need to do to make this happen? (Google ad words? Facebook ads? ... ??? - I really don't know which way to go with this.)
Could you look at my site to give me some ideas on what I ought to do to make it more effective? (it is very plain right now - bachchoraleharmony.com)

Slightly unrelated:
How would I go about learning these kinds of marketing skills that you possess? (as a total newbie here)

Thank you ahead of time.
This is a great thing that you are offering to do here.

 

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[Oven]

Here what I would do ... Give me your stats in terms of traffic/CTR/CPC/SALES$/SPENT

Hey sorry for responding a bit late. Here are my stats from Facebook:

I made $77.6 in sales, including shipping. Only $27 in profit.

I've paused the campaign after 4 days ($20/day) since I was losing money. Today I started a new campaign but I'm trying cpm instead of cpc to see if it works better. I've changed up my site a bit added a few more reviews I took them off my suppliers ebay page so it's a bit more ethical but I'd rather stay away from doing much more of that. I changed my prices so instead of posters being $11.99 with $10 shipping they are now $16.99 with $5 shipping and free shipping when you buy 2 or more posters. I think this will encourage people to buy multiple posters at once and free shipping sounds good!

THERE are many people here that can help us with SHIPPING.

I'm dropshipping the posters so not sure if anyone is able to help me? Since it will have to be done through my supplier? I emailed my supplier though and asked him if it's possible at all to improve the shipping price and if he's experimented with including some of the shipping cost in the product (He sells on eBay mostly) and he told me he's been shipping since 1999 and this is the best price he could get and he actually loses money a lot of the time when shipping worldwide.

He also told me the big bargain I should be advertising is the one shipping fee for unlimited amount of posters (But I think shipping free on 2 or more posters sounds better). According to him eBay sales at this time of the year are dead as well and I just need to wait it out, Febuary should be better. He also mentioned that the site might take a bit of time to catch on and to be patient.

Thanks for helping, I'm looking forward to your response.

 

[JasonR]

ful

-communication
-confidence
-mindset
-emotion control
Someone who is super confidence, who is not afraid of failing, who can control his emotion (fear mainly) and who can communicate really well are usually super successful.

I love this post. Super insightful.

 

[stranger]

I surely can ... let me do google/youtube it for the next 30 minutes

P.S: I can answer anything (or almost) about traffic - affiliate marketing - where to start - scaling your business etc.

Ok, how to get free backlinks to a new freelancing website without spending a penny?
Thanks.

 

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[Laverdure]

Laverdure,

Thank you in advance for starting this thread and offering your insight!

My website is www.milliondollar2014.com - it's a blog that details my attempt to make a million dollars in the calendar year 2014 starting from $0, where my readers can learn from my mistakes and triumphs and follow my progress. My personal goal with the site isn't e-commerce sales or anything, it's simply to provide valuable and/or interesting business content and build a readership/social media following. Having that platform will open doors for me, for example polling the market about my ideas, sponsored book reviews, and just getting the word out about any business ideas I do go through with.

Do you have any advice for SEO for my site, and how to build a readership/SM following?

I know nothing about SEO to be honest.

good content and value will get you known.

Find a blog expert and try to see how he do.

 

[Laverdure]

How can I raise my standards and keep them consistently high as possible? Mainly in terms of income generation.

- In other words, how do you stay hungry? Very hungry.

It's something you have to create.

It's not easy but you have to talk to yourself and push yourself to the next limit.

We all know what we should be doing but yet we don't do it... when you see that pattern be aware of it and don't let yourself be lazy.